Homo Sapiens: Under Way by Stanislaw Przybyszewski and translated by Joe E Bandel
XII.
Falk woke around noon. He couldn’t lift his head from the pillows; it was heavy like a lead ball, and sparkling sparks danced before his eyes.
With difficulty he adjusted the pillows, finally sat up, and tried to fix an object in his gaze.
It worked.
But a terrible compulsion laid itself on his organism. He was as if hypnotized: he had to say something to Marit.
What?
He didn’t know.
But it was something; he had to go to her at any price, he had to say something to her.
With superhuman effort he crawled out of bed. Yes, he had to say something.
He checked himself.
That was certainly a compulsion. Yes. But still: he had to go to Marit.
He stood up, but had to sit again.
The soles touched the floorboards. A soothing, almost painful cold prickled through his body.
Oh, how good that was!
He needed a little more air, a little morning air. Yes, what time was it actually?
“So late, so late; but it will probably be cool outside. Was there really a storm? or did he only dream it?”
His clothes lay in a puddle of water on the floor. A great fear seized him.
“No, no: Mother can’t have seen it, otherwise the things wouldn’t be lying here.”
He felt stronger, went to the wardrobe and changed the suit.
God, God, how his head hurt. With difficulty he dressed.
Like a thief he crept to the door of the room his mother occupied.
She wasn’t there!
Falk breathed a sigh of relief. It hurt him.
“Only say that one thing… say to Marit… then I’ll crawl back into bed… then I can be sick. But only say it.”
He went out.
When Marit saw him, she jumped up in alarm. Falk smiled forcedly.
“No; it’s nothing; I only caught a little cold in the night. I have a little fever. By the way, I should have stayed home. But I absolutely had to come to you. I don’t know why. Just quickly give me some cognac…”
He hastily drank a large glass of cognac.
“You see; I got up; it was so terribly hard. But if I lay on my deathbed, I would have had to come to you. Oh: The cognac did very well. It lowers the temperature. That’s namely my standing phrase. I just don’t understand: why not lying?”
Falk began to babble, but controlled himself again. Marit looked at him in horror.
“No, no, leave me; you see, it’s so terribly uncanny what an animal such an overman is. For I am an overman. You understand that? There I suddenly get, probably in sleep, such inspirations. I wake: I know nothing of the whole story; I remember only the final result. No; I don’t remember; for I don’t know if I dreamed something similar; but I know that I had to come to you. I am sick; very sick. But I had to come to you.”
Again his strength left him.
He saw a fire-garland before his eyes, a reddish-green fire-garland; it split into seven lightnings and tore a willow apart.
Marit stared at him, in growing despair.
“Erik my God, what is it with you? You are sick—you must go home—oh God, God, why do you stare at me so horribly?”
“No, just leave it. On the way stands a willow; it is split in two parts; when I went—to you—yes, to you—wasn’t I with you? Yes right: when I went to you, there I examined the willow and searched in the trunk for the thunderbolt. I always did that as a child.”
A lightning, a thousand lightnings killed the little dove.
“But what I wanted to say to you. For I must say something to you. Pour me more cognac.”
“Erik, for heaven’s sake, you must go home! I will immediately have the carriage hitched. I will bring you home.”
Marit ran out…
“What he had to say… had to?!”
Little dove and lightnings… then house, dream… life… destruction… Yes! Destruction! He—a hurricane—an overman—who strides over corpses—and begets life.
Yes, yes: destroy… Destroy!
A wild, jubilant cruelty grew up in him; a joyful, mad lust for torment. He had to see that! yes: that, how the frog writhed under his scalpel, how it slid up the four nails to the nail heads. Then cut out the heart… How it twitches on the table, how it jumps!
Before Falk’s eyes the objects began to dance. Marit stood before him, ready for travel, in helpless fear.
“Come, Erik; come! my only one, come!” She kissed his eyes.
“Still… still once…” He begged like a small child. “Come now! Come, my sweet, only man you.”
“No—still—let! I must say something to you. There sit down—opposite me—on the chair.”
So, Marit, listen: I am not your husband at all, I am married. Yes, really: married. My wife is in Paris. Yes right: Fräulein Perier is my wife. She really is. Don’t you believe it? No, wait, my marriage contract…
He began nervously searching in his pockets. Suddenly he came to his senses.
He smiled idiotically.
“No you, what black holes do you have in your head? You look like a skull. No, don’t look at me like that—don’t look at me—no, let—let—I go—I go.”
Falk ducked in growing fear.
“I go, I go already…” He whimpered like an animal, “I go—yes—yes…”
He ran out.
“No, get in here!” called the coachman. “I’ll drive you!”
“Get in? Yes, get in…” Falk climbed into the carriage that was waiting.
“Where is my hat? No, the hat isn’t there…” Falk held it in his hands… “But that’s strange! – –”
Marit sat in the room with the hat on her head; she was completely paralyzed.
There he drove, yes. Really? No. Yes; yes. Yes.
Not a single thought! So she was dead. No, she dreamed. No, she didn’t dream.
And again she saw clearly, as once before, Falk’s face: it bit her with sucking vampire eyes, it gnawed at her soul with grinning scorn… Liar…
She knew, she saw it: now finally he had told the truth. So she sat probably an hour long.
So he was married!
“Married—” she repeated coldly and harshly.
She felt how her interior froze to ice; everything crawled in her together to one point; the warmth ebbed and ebbed. Everything shrank to the one, small, tiny point: Married…
She saw his uncannily glowing eyes. Her head grew confused.
She jumped up.
No, how could she have forgotten that! She quickly undressed; her gaze fell into the mirror.
No, with the hat on her head she couldn’t possibly go to the kitchen; that would be droll.
She smiled dully to herself.
She went to the kitchen; bread was to be baked. She ordered it.
She was active with feverish unrest. Then she came back to the room.
Above the sofa hung a picture that consisted only of letters; there in such strange flourishes and with glaring Byzantine initials the Lord’s Prayer was printed.
She examined it attentively.
“How hideous this dragon around the U…” She read: And forgive us our sins…
“No, wait, Marit…” She sat on the chair.
“Yes, there sat Falk. Now he said…”
Married! it sounded steel-hard in her ears. “Yes really: married to Fräulein Perier.” She went to the window and looked out.
“How the day drags. Yes! until June 21 the days get longer.”
She looked at the clock. It was five in the afternoon.
Now the brother would soon come from gymnastics: she had to get him coffee.
A carriage rolled into the yard…
“You, Marit, Falk is terribly sick…”
The brother told hastily, tumbling over himself… When Hans brought him home, he had to be lifted from the carriage; he couldn’t recognize any person. His mother cried terribly, and then came the district physician…
“So, Falk is sick…”
Marit wanted to tell the brother that Falk was married, but she controlled herself.
Now his wife will come, and will nurse the poor, nicotine-poisoned man, and bear his moods like an angel… yes…
She went up to her room.
One should not disturb her; she would lie down a little to sleep… Falk is terribly sick… he had to be carried… his mother
cried…
Marit walked restlessly back and forth… I must go to him… immediately… he will die.
Her head was bursting; she grasped high with both hands. Married! Married! it droned continuously.
“I will make you so happy, so happy, and will never leave you!”
A weeping rage rose choking in her throat: God! God! How he had lied!
And a shame and foaming indignation.
Good Lord: had it really happened? Yes… oh yes… happiness.
She felt how he gently rocked her body; back and forth. She felt his hot, greedy lips; on her whole body. She saw herself undressed; he embraced her… And from all corners hideous ghosts emerged, wild, laughing, distorted mask-faces that grinned at her and spat at her.
She crawled into herself; she threw herself on the bed, buried herself in the pillows.
With her own nails dig herself a grave! Oh shame… shame… On the misery of the human child the Madonna stared with stupid smile…
It grew dusk…
Beyond the lake the sun disappeared behind the peaks of the forest and poured blood-red lights over the treetops.
Marit listened.
She heard the clatter of the stork and the laughter of the maids who below in front of the house peeled potatoes for supper.
Then she heard singing. It was her brother. Then she fell asleep…
When she woke, it was night.
She sat on the edge of the bed; thought. But the thoughts kept scattering. She stared thoughtlessly into the room.
She was damned; cast out by God. Now everything was indifferent. Everything.
She thought what might not be indifferent? No, there was nothing.
“Falk is sick; but Falk betrayed her. He promised her happiness, endless happiness, and he was married. Now his wife comes and will nurse him; his Marit is damned. If she goes to him, she will be driven away. And then she will stand outside like a dog in the rain, crouched before the door. No, she had no right to him—nothing, nothing at all in the world.
Now everything is gone. Father gone, mother gone; God doesn’t exist. Yes, Falk said that. Falk is right. Otherwise God couldn’t torment his child so terribly. Everything gone…”
Finally she stood up. She made light; she wanted to arrange her hair. She stepped before the mirror.
Oh God, how she looked… No, how thin; how thin… oh, it’s indifferent…
The whole house slept.
“The happiness… the endless happiness… Yes: he gave it to me…” She took hat and coat and went to the lake.
She sat on the stone: “Cape of Good Hope” she had called it when she waited here day in, day out for Erik.
In the forest opposite stood the little fisherman’s cottage. A light, a tiny dot, crawled out the window and sank strangely torn in the trembling waves of the lake… torn…
She stared at the light and at the black water… How it pulled… how the water pulled at her…
Everything, everything is indifferent.
She was alone; no person her own. She was driven out into wind and weather like a dog before the door…
Yes, now the wife comes; she takes him away; and I remain alone! Almighty, merciful God: alone… No, no, no! Enough! Finished!
He drives away. No father. No mother. No God…
Her fear grew and grew. She feverishly fumbled at her dress. Suddenly a terrible thought rose in her:
The world is going under! Everything, everything will go under! The flood!
She jumped up abruptly:
There was a whirlpool… there it is deep… a farmhand drowned there last year… with both horses.
She ran there. In her head it droned and roared. She saw nothing; she heard nothing.
Something was in her that drove her. She only needed to run. She ran. “Yes, here!”
“No, still the little bend there… there!”
She screamed shrilly in the water… wildly… she struggled. Life! The whirlpool… Bliss…
XIII.
After a week Falk regained consciousness. At his bedside sat his wife, asleep.
He was not at all astonished. He looked at her.
It was her.
He sank back into the pillows and closed his eyes. Now everything was good. A reddish fire-garland he suddenly saw, which split into seven lightnings; then he saw a willow by the road fall apart. Marit was probably dead.
He fell asleep again.
End
Kongsvinger (Norway), June 1894.
Anarchistbanjo's World 
Leave a comment